


The Wedding Night Says: Champagne And Kisses For Everyone

by zauberer_sirin



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/M, Friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-08-01
Updated: 2010-08-01
Packaged: 2017-10-13 04:25:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,080
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/132807
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zauberer_sirin/pseuds/zauberer_sirin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>Rory Williams wonders how he could ever forget the doctor.</i> Post-"The Big Bang" vignette.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Wedding Night Says: Champagne And Kisses For Everyone

**the wedding night says: champagne and kisses for everyone**

  


  
That name - _The Doctor_ \- pierces something inside Rory, and not the way he has been hearing it before, or remembering it, remembering his best friend talk about shrinks and family upsets, and how they played imaginary friends in Amy's garden, Amy leading and setting down the rules and Rory following, following, following, a kid, a boy really, no idea he was going to fall in love with her, she was just her playmate then, Amy Pond with the red hair and the Imaginary Friend and the rest of the boys and girls thought she was a bit odd but Rory didn't, Rory loved playing games in her garden.

No, this time the words - _The Doctor_ , Rory wonders how you can capitalize words in your mind – are another kind of memory altogether: a jolt through Rory's body, like a fish swimming through his veins or something that kind of impossible, something running, leaping inside of him and suddenly there it is, _a memory_ , pushing, and after that memory another one, and another, and another, it feels a bit like being punched in the stomach, or rather like when you are a child on a swing and you suddenly let go and the next thing you know you are on the ground, on your ass, and it hurts; it's a bit like that, because _How does one forget the Doctor?_ Rory feels weirdly guilty about it, though if he knows it's not his fault and yet he does, because it's the Doctor, even if the Doctor still thinks Jeff is more handsome than Rory – okay, _he is_ , Rory admits - but that doesn't stop Rory from feeling inexplicably, unbearably guilty, when he remembers himself saying “I trust the Doctor with my life”, when he remembers a shared, prison-like dream and cold and the sound of birds, when he remembers Venice as a wedding present (it was that or tokens), when he remembers punching the Doctor, and the memory of how he himself, once, died for the Doctor.

Amy stands up in the middle of the banquet hall, all confident and determined and _crazy_ , and shouts “ _I remember you!_ ” and Rory wonders, marvels, awed: how could he have forgotten in the first place?

  
*

  
Surely the Doctor has to be doing it on purpose. Nobody dances that badly. It's unnatural.

`Thank you, Doctor,´ Rory says.

`What?´

`You dancing so badly. So that I don't have to be the worst dancer at my wedding. That's very thoughtful of you.´

`But I'm not doing this on purpose!´ The Doctor protests, red in his face.

Rory laughs and thinks _My God, how could I ever forget?_ and the edges of his vision glow a bit, he feels drunk but just a tiny bit, in that way champagne has of making you a drunk and a bit ashamed to be drunk at the same time because it's just champagne, but the glowy part is not just the champagne, it's everything, it's the ring on his finger, new and strange and priceless, it's Amy's smile as she dances with her father, and it's the Doctor, bad dancing moves and all, looking ridiculous and beautiful in those clothes, and suddenly Rory feels incredibly grateful for this day, all of it, grateful for Amy, for the wedding, for the adventures finally remembered, for the Doctor.

Afterwards the Doctor watches Rory and Amy dance, overcome with a sort of longing that can only be associated with extreme happiness, not just other people's happiness but his own, his intense overwhelming happiness not just _for_ Amy and Rory but _at_ Amy and Rory, this glowing pride he has for them, words like glee and joy shimmering like secrets inside his pockets. A bit jealous too, at how _easy_ they manage to make it look, just standing there dancing slowly, Amy and Rory, Rory and Amy; jealous yes, because the Doctor can be many things, he can, in fact, be almost _any_ thing, but he suspects that he can never be something as simple as _Amy and Rory, Rory and Amy_ and maybe he wants that, just a bit.

  
*

  
They go after the Doctor. Amy stops him – one hand on his chest and Rory gets a bit distracted by the idea of the wedding ring on her finger and thinks _yes!_ \- when he sees River talking to him. They hide – sort of, they might be a bit tipsy still and Amy giggles softly, or Rory does, he is not completely sure – and watch the Doctor talk to River and make a strange face for a moment; Rory doesn't think he's ever seen the Doctor make that face, not even when he was angry or sad or anything, it's weird, like watching an old friend you haven't seen in years and his face is not exactly how you remember. Rory doesn't know what the expression on the Doctor's face means but he has the urge to go and hug him and now that's silly, Rory Williams, well, Rory Pond really.

  
*

  
The Doctor hangs up the phone and starts the TARDIS and sets the (hopefully correct) coordinates. And he doesn't stop grinning.

`I'm going to change,´ Amy announces. `Adventure: not so good for the wedding dress. And it is a pretty dress too.´

She twirls. She actually twirls, the way girls do in movies and children's book illustrations. And then she goes upstairs. The dress is pretty and Rory feels a bit girly for just thinking that.

`Should I change?´ Rory asks the Doctor.

`Possibly.´

`Shouldn't you change?´

`Or we could do it in style,´ the Doctor replies, pushing a button on the console. Rory knows the Doctor has not idea what that button is for. He doesn't know how he knows this but he _does_. `The Orient Express, Rory.´

`In space.´

`In space!´

The Doctor tries to hide a mild disappointed with the fact that it's not the original Orient Express because he loves space-travelling as much as the next, well, space-traveller, but he has shelves of Poirot paperbacks in the TARDIS library and that accounts for something.

`Doctor...´

Rory's tone is low and serious now and the Doctor is suddenly afraid that he is going to ask if he has candles or roses or a luxury suite on the TARDIS because the Doctor realizes JUST NOW that this is Amy and Rory's wedding night and maybe he should stall the space-and-time adventure mission for a bit because Wedding Night, with capitals and all, and the Doctor would love to do something nice for them but at the same time _ew, human sexual proceedings_ and he would be cool with that, completely, except this is HIS SHIP so also no, no, no, and also because Amelia Pond was a little girl just a few moments ago and what happened to that? But mainly no, no, no, not ON BOARD his ship, his precious gorgeous _innocent_ ship. (A voice in his head, Amy's to be exact, goes: _Please, Doctor, really, you think we haven't fooled around the TARDIS already?_ and then she would wink or do something equally tomboy-ish except it's just a voice in his head) (oh, yeah, perfect, now he can't get that _idea_ out of his mind, gross)

The Doctor has this faraway look as if he hasn't heard the question or if he has it was a million years ago for him; he does that sometimes. Rory is not sure he's ever getting used to that: when the Doctor frowns because his mind is going light-speed and definitively leaving you behind.

`Doctor.´

`No, Rory, I don't have a luxury suite!´

`Okay. Fine.´ He pauses. What was that about? `I forgot you.´

`What?´

`The crack. And then I was a Roman. And then I forgot you.´

The Doctor smiles.

`It's okay, Rory,´ he says and goes back to his controls, to all the buttons he has no idea what are there for.

`No it's not!´ Rory says, with unexpected urgency. And: `I'm sorry I forgot you, Doctor.´

The Doctor huffs and snorts and makes a “ _nevermind that, really_ ” gesture with his left hand. But then Rory comes up to him, very close, personal-space-invasion close, and throws his arms around the Doctor. He hugs him and it is very awkward, arms and hands don't know where to go and Rory doesn't know where to put his head, almost resting it on the Doctor's shoulder before deciding that's a bit, uh, maybe not, and the Doctor not moving his hands because Rory has sort of _trapped_ him with his own so he cannot return the hug, but because it is very awkward it also sort of _very nice_ , the Doctor thinks, because it's very genuine and felt and really touching and-

Rory doesn't quite know what to do either, for a moment breaking off the hug would be even more awkward – no, really, what do you do with your hands? - than staying like this a bit longer. Rory draws a long breath and he can feel the Doctor heartbeat, or rather _hearts_ beat, two of them, something wondrous, and yes, a bit creepy if Rory stops to think about it.

`Okay, Rory, that's enough,´ the Doctor says curtly.

Rory breaks the hug and _it is_ even more awkward. What do you do with you hands? And all that closeness. Rory feels kind of inappropriate. Then the Doctor puts his hand on Rory's head and starts ruffling his hair. Sometimes Rory gets the feeling the Doctor is everybody's grandfather.

`Oh, Rory, my plastic Roman soldier,´ the Doctor sighs.

`Ye- No. Not plastic anymore.´

`You will be always my little plastic boy´ he says fondly.

Rory shrugs: `Thanks. I guess?´

If the Doctor were the kind to talk things out he'd probably say this: that Rory is not just Mister Pond to him, not only that, even if in the beginning he was just that, just _Amy's Rory_ , not in a mean way, not in a just-an-appendage way, and even if he was momentarily _Rory-who-Amy-chose-over-me_ and that stung a bit, even then he liked Rory, he liked Rory a lot, he loved Rory a lot, and the Doctor wants to say just that: maybe he wouldn't have picked up a little boy named Rory if he had crashed in his garden – mainly he doubts little-boy!Rory would have come with him if he had asked – but knowing what he knows now the Doctor would ask Rory to come with him _today_ , and not because he is Mister Pond (though he is) and not because he is Amy's Rory (though he definitely is) but because he is Rory.

But the Doctor doesn't talk about this kind of stuff, so instead he keeps ruffling Rory's hair a little bit longer, until it's awkward again. Also nice. The Doctor can handle awkward and nice.

`On second thoughts maybe we should change, the tux is a rental´ Rory tells him. (He thinks: that's lame, I'm not technically wearing a tux, this is a suit, an awesome and beautiful wedding-day suit, and I can afford suits on my nurse's pay, thank you very much) (maybe the Doctor's tux is a rental - he wants to ask - where do aliens rent these things, anyway?)

`Yep, Goddesses are messy´ the Doctor says, jumping off the console and to the stairs. `Maybe I'll be in the wardrobe, well, in the pool, for a while. A good while. If you know what I mean...´

Rory frowns: `No, I don't.´

The Doctor clears his throat, except it doesn't sound like throat-clearing, it sounds more like “ _weddingnightokayrory?_ ”

Rory gets it. It takes him a moment but he gets it. The Doctor turns kind of _pink_ and runs his hands over the back of his neck, stepping up and down the same step on the stairs a couple of times.

`Oh thank you, thank you, Doc-´

`No, no, no. Let us not speak of it, let us not dwell on it, shoo, off you go, plastic Mister Pond.´

And the Doctor disappears up the stairs to the wardrobe/pool/planetarium. Rory stays by the console for a minute. There's no silence, because there's the continuous hum of the TARDIS under his feet, driving them all somewhere far and wonderful, and Rory runs his thumb over his wedding ring and he thinks _wedding night_ and he thinks he really loves the Doctor right now.

He walks up the stairs two steps at a time.


End file.
